B-21 Gets a Name

The Air Force has selected a name for the B-21 long-range strike bomber: Raider. Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James unveiled the name during the Air Force Association’s Air, Space and Cyber Conference Sept. 19 in Oxon Hill, Md. The name was selected after a service-wide contest that garnered more than 2,100 different nominations. Two of the three winners are: Lt. Col. Jaime I. Hernandez, 337th Test and Evaluation Squadron commander, Dyess Air Force Base, Texas; and Tech. Sgt. Derek D. White, an emergency management craftsman with the 175th Civil Engineering Squadron, Maryland Air National Guard. The third, retired Lt. Col. Richard E. Cole, was a Doolittle Raider during World War II. He took part in the daring April 18, 1942 mission in which 16 B-25 Mitchell bombers took off from the carrier Hornet and struck the Japanese mainland, the first such air raid during the war. The B-21 is under development. Once the Raider eventually joins the inventory, it would replace a fleet of bombers with an average age of 27 years today.